In general, in medical activities where the lives of patients are concerned, clinical diagnosis occupies an important role in the treatment of such patients. The development of medical technology is very beneficial in helping medical professionals to perform precise clinical diagnoses, and it is expected that dependency on the development of medical technology will increase.
Modality or medical imaging apparatus, such as Computer Tomography (CT) equipment and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) equipment, has become essential equipment in modern medicine. In current medical procedures, however, an image of an abnormal body part of a patient is captured by pieces of modality, and the captured image is printed out in a film form and transferred to the physician in charge of the patient. Accordingly, a lot of time and manpower are necessary to make a final clinical diagnosis, which leads to inefficient resource management and wasted hospital funds. Additionally, rapid and precise treatment cannot be provided to a patient.
Furthermore, in Korea, the statute provides that an X-ray film must be kept for 5 years. In each hospital, X-ray films are classified and stored in accordance with patients. As the size of a hospital and the number of patients increase, the number of X-ray films to be maintained also increases. This results in several problems, such as the waste of space and manpower due to the storing and management of X-ray films, films being damaged due to poor storage or management, necessary re-photographing due to the loss of films, medical disputes over the loss of films, and the waste of time and manpower necessary to locate stored films.
Meanwhile, with the development of computers and communication technology, systems for providing medical service using computers and data communication technology have been researched and developed even in the medical field in which the lives of patients are handled. For example, a picture archiving and communication system (PACS) in which a computer communication network is installed throughout the entire hospital, all X-ray films are converted into digital data and put into a database, the digital data is stored in a high-capacity storage medium connected to a server, and the X-ray images of a desired patient can be checked in each doctor's office through a computer monitor if necessary, has recently been introduced.
PACS is a comprehensive digital image management system and transmission system for retrieving medical images, in particular, radiologic diagnostic images in a digital form, storing the medical images in a digital data form instead of the typical X-ray film form, sending the medial images over a high-speed communication network, and allowing radiologists and clinicians to treat patients using an image inquiry device instead of the existing film view box.
The ultimate goal of PACS is to construct a filmless hospital system. To this end, techniques, such as image display and processing, data communication and networking, a database, information management, a User Interface (UI), and data storage and management, must be comprehensively constructed.
Communication in PACS is performed using Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) protocol as a standard. The DICOM protocol refers to a communication protocol that efficiently supports communication between various digital image acquisition apparatuses, such as those used in CT, MRI, nuclear medicine, and ultrasonic waves, and other information systems using an industry standard network. The communication protocol was developed and jointly standardized by the American College of Radiology (ACR) and the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEM) in 1984. In 1985, the first standard of the communication protocol was established.
Thereafter, the communication protocol underwent two revisions, in 1988 and 1993, and thus reached the current version 3.0, which has become called DICOM.
The background of the DICOM protocol lies in that as the medical industry becomes information-oriented, modalities have typically been used in conjunction with each other, rather than being used independently, and there is a need for agreement in exchanging medical images and corresponding information between modalities.
That is, in the past, unless manufacturers purchased expensive gateways, communication between the manufacturers was impossible, because the manufacturers employed different methods of storing and communicating information depending on the type and model of modality, and no specific standard was adhered to.
Now that the DICOM standard has been established, however, manufacturers that comply with the DICOM standard can exchange information without the need for special gateways, irrespective of their modality. This means that communication with remote places has become possible, in addition to communication between modalities supporting the DICOM standard within a hospital.
Furthermore, since a standard method widely being used in the computer industry is used as a network configuration method for the DICOM standard, the DICOM standard can be easily applied to connections within a hospital, communication between remote clinics, and all medical image-related systems including remote diagnostic systems.
In general, a radiologist chiefly uses thin-slice data for generating a three-dimensional (3D) medical image, and a clinician chiefly uses thick-slice data for generating a two-dimensional (2D) medical image.
In a clinical medicine department that requires medical procedures and operations, requests for 3D functionality using thin-slice data are increasing, but an image captured in a radiology department is sent to the clinical medicine department because it is difficult to use the thin-slice data directly in the clinical medicine department due to limits, such as a data storage limit and a limited transmission bandwidth. However, there is a problem in that the captured image can be used only limitedly because it cannot be three-dimensionally rotated for a viewpoint desired by a clinician. That is, there is a problem in that a clinician cannot check a 3D medical image from a desire viewpoint.
Accordingly, there is a need for a method that reduces the computational load and the amount of data transfer and also allows a clinician to check a 3D medical image from a desired viewpoint.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.